Taxi Driver Online

Similar to many previous articles from big and small operators, so no surprise that Veezu group getting in on the act.

But it follows the usual formula:

1 Shortage of drivers, blah, blah.

2 Apology to customers

3 Come drive with us an earn bundles

But I suspect the Bristol Post's strapline here is misleading - probably Veezu as a whole needs 4,000 drivers, and not just V Cars in the Bristol area. Indeed, the main text of the article confirms that


One of Bristol's biggest taxi firms hit by shortage of drivers - passengers warned of delays

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bris ... ms-6084060

V Cars needs to hire 4,000 new drivers


Image: Bristol Post

One of Bristol's biggest taxi firms has confirmed it's suffering from a shortage of licenced drivers and has called for "patience" from customers.

V Cars, which operates in Bristol as well as Bath, Chippenham and Swindon, has been hit by the same driver shortages that have seen fuel delivery processes struggle in recent weeks.

Veezu, which owns five regional brands including V Cars, says it is currently looking for 4,000 new drivers across England and Wales to combat the shortages and meet the current demand in bookings after thousands of registered drivers left the industry during the Covid pandemic.

The company says more and more bookings are expected to be received as the weather turns colder and wetter throughout autumn and winter, with V Cars saying it will "take time" to process and licence new drivers.

A release issued by V Cars says: "During Covid many authorities stopped processing applications and have only recently restarted the process, but it will take time to licence sufficient driver partners to satisfy the high level of demand and this is affecting all private hire operators in the UK.

"Since lockdown restrictions eased and people began going about their daily lives again, demand has increased and is putting pressure on operators like V Cars who match bookings with available self-employed driver partners.

"The high demand for bookings, coupled with calls about existing bookings, has seen tens of thousands of additional calls each weekend being received by several regional Journey Booking Centres across the country. Subsequently, V Cars is recruiting call advisors to help manage the expectations of those wanting to travel."

Ryan Owen, Managing Director of V Cars, said the company was taking "all the steps we can" and that he hoped the public would "understand and empathise with our situation".

He said: "Regrettably, passengers are having to wait longer than normal. We are taking all the steps we can to increase the number of licensed drivers to match the high demand of journeys by the public.

"Just like within the road haulage industry there is a nationwide shortage of licensed private hire drivers. We ask for patience as we partner with new and additional drivers to meet resurgent demand.

"It’s a great time to partner with Veezu and one of our regional brands such as V Cars. Driver partners are self-employed and have total flexibility to work the hours they want. This autumn and winter we anticipate the demand for bookings will surpass pre-COVID levels, there is good money to be made driving.

"We are doing everything we possibly can as quickly as we can. We hope the public can understand that the private hire industry is facing severe shortages and can empathise with our situation.

"We would like to remind passengers that the quickest and most effective way of booking a car is to use our app. We also encourage passengers to use the app to track the arrival of their car and get fare estimate in less than 20 seconds!"

I'm sure the Bath & North East Somerset HC trade will be cock-a-hoop that the Bristol Post has used a photo of some of their fleet to illustrate the article

And the photo caption the Post uses on the website is mildly amusing for legal eagles perhaps:

V Cars needs to hire 4,000 more workers

But I suspect the caption writer didn't realise the significance of the w-word when Veezu laying it on as thick as usual with its 'driver-partner' spiel

In other words they need another £2 million a year revenue to finance their acquisition program

I'm sure the frivers aren't too worried about the "shortages"

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Like Uber etc appearing in local newspaper titles with the same spiel, this is the Leeds version of the Veezu press release, via Amber Cars.

In fact, I wouldn't bother reading it, because it's just a carbon copy of the Bristol article.

Only difference is that the quotes are attributed to Amber's regional director.

Funny that he's said precisely the same thing as V Cars in Bristol

I wonder if they really said these things, or just 'said' what was in the press notice issued by the corporate communications department (or whatever it's called) at Veezu HQ?

And, from the journalism perspective and the Bristol Post and Yorkshire Post, it's a classic example of 'churnalism' - all they've done is rearrange the Veezu news release


Why Amber Cars is asking Leeds customers to show patience and understanding

https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... ng-3424641

Leeds’ largest taxi and private hire vehicle firm today called on customers to show patience as driver shortages impact waiting times.

Why don't these companies address the reason drivers aren't flooding back to them?

Partly down to many drivers returning home due to the pandemic, partly down to drivers still not feeling safe working, partly down to far better options now available outside of the trade, and partly down to sensible people deciding this isn't a trade that they should consider joining.

Also the business model of the traditional firms isn't that appealing anymore to many many drivers i.e. pay a fixed weekly rent and maybe a pound or two extra when working busy unsocial hours, compared to the likes of Uber, Bolt and Ola who's business model is no weekly rent and double/treble rates when it's busy.

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IDFIMH

This is the Go Carz version. Just the Veezu news release with the words 'Go Carz' plugged in, so not worth reading again.

However, the Shropshire Star has also included short quotes from a couple of smaller operators at the end of the piece, but nothing there that hasn't been done to death already:


Taxi firms ask for patience as they warn of impacts of driver shortages

https://www.shropshirestar.com/news/bus ... shortages/

Taxi firms operating across the region are asking for understanding and patience from passengers during the autumn and winter months as widespread driver shortages across the industry impact the company.

This is the rehash from Dragon Taxis:


Dragon Taxis Newport and Torfaen on driver shortage

https://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/news/ ... -shortage/

DRAGON Taxis is urging passengers to be patient during the coming months, with driver shortages having an impact.

Obviously didn't read every word of all that, but couldn't help noticing the spelling mistake in this final paragraph:


Which is slightly amusing as a pun (what's the fate of the car you ordered - will it actually turn up?).

But you'd assume all that stuff is just copied and pasted, so where did the spelling mistake come from? It's correctly spelled 'fare' in the other articles...

Also interesting that an exclamation mark at the end of that paragraph has been removed, as is also the case with the Go Carz version. The Amber Cars and V Cars versions both include the exclamation mark at the end:


No doubt there are other inconsistencies if anyone went through them all with a fine tooth comb.

But only noticed that because an exclamation mark is unusual in corporate press releases like that!

In fact journalists tend not to like them (they call them 'screamers' etc), so it was maybe the newspapers that removed them rather than Veezu or its regional operations!!

But which is maybe a lesson for some contributors on here!!!

use of punctuation marks to emphasize points is part of the fun this is an internet forum not an exam paper or a thesis

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Yes, and my point was just a bit of fun as well, as indeed indicated by the exclamation marks!

Although I tend to use smilies on here in that regard, which obviously another set of people won't like

But although these things are to an extent a matter of taste, they do matter at times, and do mean something to some people, as indeed is demonstrated by the missing Veezu exclamation mark!

As regards your point about internet forums etc, indeed that sort of thing does demonstrate more divergent approaches. Some people like to dot the Is and cross the Ts, while others take a more, er, casual approach.

But to a degree this matters - in a row of comments on a newspaper website, for example, I generally either ignore or at least brush past those who take the more casual approach. Likewise, if everyone on here took the casual approach I probably wouldn't bother posting here at all

Better late than never, this is the Brum rehash of the Veezu news release - A2B Radio Cars.

No point rereading all that again, but the article also quotes a couple of local operators, and one is quite interesting, so have posted them in another thread.


City's largest taxi company asks customers for 'patience and understanding' amid driver shortage

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/m ... s-21984051

It comes after we reported driver shortages - and Christmas delays are expected